Is there such a thing as perfect timing? Ok, maybe not perfect but what about mediocre timing? If someone asks you for a favor after a hot bath, after you’ve eaten, and your mind is rather relaxed—aren’t you more inclined?

I’m starting to believe in the world of MOP.

I made that up. But everything is all about marketing, opportunity, and perspective. “The lure of the distant and the difficult is deceptive. The great opportunity is where you are.” Yes, Burroughs, was another of my loves.

*

Marketing—

In the way we advertise ourselves. In our confidence, in our pep. I’m usually called chipper or spunky, or as my tagline announces… ‘Mean as a cupcake.’ But, really, in my opinion our personalities make us furthermore desirable after the looks have worn and the newness fades. It’s the way we market ourselves, the value we put in ourselves. Not the power we let others give or take from us.

*

Opportunity—

I’m talking about timing, conquering fear, adrenaline, going for what you know you want. Making way for the fail, the trip, or the fly. The way we face it is the way we come out of it. I’ll never forget what a friend of mine said when I applied to a college (obviously the next one I got in) and I didn’t get accepted in:

“I know you got in this time, but I’m more proud of how you brushed your knees off last time.”

Or maybe my all time x lover Bukowski said it best, with reverse psychology and sarcasm.

“It was true that I didn’t have much ambition, but there ought to be a place for people without ambition, I mean a better place than the one usually reserved. How in the hell could a man enjoy being awakened at 6:30 a.m. by an alarm clock, leap out of bed, dress, force-feed, shit, piss, brush teeth and hair, and fight traffic to get to a place where essentially you made lots of money for somebody else and were asked to be grateful for the opportunity to do so?”

—Charles Bukowski, Factotum

*

Perspective—

“I think you can love a person too much.

You put someone up on a pedestal, and all of a sudden, from that perspective, you notice what’s wrong – a hair out of place, a run in a stocking, a broken bone. You spend all your time and energy making it right, and all the while, you are falling apart yourself. You don’t even realize what you look like, how far you’ve deteriorated, because you only have eyes for someone else.”
―Jodi Picoult, Handle With Care

*

I’ve let opportunity slip, I’ve left the glass slipper—no prince showed. I’ve thought about it before. That maybe if I’d been in a prior relationship at any other time; it might have worked out. I’ve prayed, hoped, self-helped, sought counsel, psych, pillow screamed, pop pill—plopt dat *ss down on the couch and pouted, stopped, shouted, stomped off. Ran away on sabbaticals for days and days without contact, SOS soon I’m licking my wounds right now. Planned for the worst, and hoped for the best type of psychoanalytical reverse inverse ~comatosis~. And all I can come up with is this:

Enough already. Because most of the things I’ve hesitated for I’ve lost. Most of the things I’ve gone for I’ve gotten. Most of my gut feelings were right about things that were wrong, but right about things that were right. I’ve lived by Mark Twain when he said to “Always acknowledge a fault. This will throw those in authority off their guard and give you an opportunity to commit more.”

I’ve french kissed frogs a few times. They turned into monkeys, actually. Bored of the inevitable. Thought about forever, then went out of touch. In an unquenchable thirst for someone to take me house shopping, I’ve found myself—utterly afraid to opportunize anything, it’s quite shiteous, really. Maybe my timing is off? Maybe if I sleep more he’ll wake me with a kiss. Have I been poisoned? It’s my party and I can cry if I want to.

They say patience is a virtue, but really, am I missing my window of opportunity because I’m climbing my pretty legs out of it?

Every five minutes the thing nearest me changed into a mistake and disappeared. —Tao Lin

I’m in, if, of, and. I miss him like writing with my left hand. Tea cup got up and said “damn, that’s bad.” The what you’ve got til’ it’s gone. Watching me sleep. Zumba drop out. Clothes don’t fold themselves. Walls don’t happen to paint themselves fireplace red. Over my head. Send to journals. Write it. Revise it. Read it. Scratch it out. Insomniacs anonymous. He winked at me! And then I am there. I love it when a man winks. Then I have blacked. Then I am where? He said welcome to my world and held my hand while we were going under. I don’t swim like a fishie. How come they don’t tell you the things you want are gonna hurt this much? I’m poppin’ Motrins on a roller coaster.

We all know the common no one’s perfect, and no one is. But just for once I want to be the person someone is talking about instead of just overhearing some stranger’s conversation that “my sister just won $26,000 on the penny slots in Vegas!” I want to be less envious of better writers, and more courageous.

So here I go as promised; some fiction if you will:

C-List Celebrity

He was a C-list celebrity. Cute enough. Brown hair, bright blue eyes, sometimes green— which made me immediately think of babies. Our babies would have his eyes because of the dominant gene, or maybe not, anyway— lucky him. He wore baseball caps, switched jobs like cigarettes, and drove a brand new car— very little mileage I’d noticed from the first time he picked me up. This time we were going to go to a bar lounge. He sent me a text when he was outside.

I threw on my zebra heels, powder pink lipstick, and crimped my hair for aesthetics. High-waist black mini skirt, lavender lace top, black camisole. If I am going to cause a scene, I’m going to cause one. I’s colored my hair auburn in regret; I’d made so many mistakes since my ex had put a hex on me two years prior.

“Hey beautiful,” he says to me in his Boston accent.

“Heiiii” I clamor back, just then not sure if I should go out at all.

I pull the handle of the toy truck. New car smell. Ah. Same as I remember from a few weeks earlier. Third date’s the date something’s supposed to happen. Something always happens on the third date.

“Melissa-Janaé you look…” Jerry does his fingers like a New York pizza maker, kissing the tips in a delectable fashion. It makes me giggle and squirm. The night may be up to something.

We scavenge around Los Angeles to end at a lounge decorated in blue accents. Streaming lights and cameras flash as we exit the car, valet dashes off without manners only nods and I find myself clutching his arm. Perhaps a B-list celebrity? I walk through golden-rimmed doors and a shimmering chandelier to shit yourself over. Jerry takes my hand and leads me straight to the bar. Everyone seems to know him as a regular. I recognize people from TV shows, but know none of their names.

“A shot of patron and a shot of that” he points at some basic tequila.

I don’t like drinking on an empty stomach, without prior conversation, or taking shots as a precursor for the night ahead. Back to a bad night, I think to myself.

The tall over friendly bartender pours the shots without looking, but staring definitely at me. He is staring at my legs, I can tell. We take the shots and mine goes down smoothly, follows with me sucking the top of my mouth deliciously, The alcohol races to my arms, I am going to do something stupid tonight. Utterly undoably stupid.

Jerry flounders on about some fight and how he was such a tough guy back in his heyday and I try to pretend that I’m interested although I am listening. Listening was never my problem, caring about what was being said. Ah.

We end up taking two more shots apiece, I feel them tremendously and tell myself, if nothing else this will solidify freedom. My ex can’t come back, if I’ve finally moved on—at least physically. “Show off” is still dancing around himself while I’ve eyed three other guys interested, two on a couch adjacent very apparently brothers.

“Those heels are magnificent,” Jerry says to me. Obviously not a fan of the heels but rather the upper thigh. I sigh and smile, obviously not in need of a compliment, but rather stimulating conversation. He asks if I am ready to go which meant my body language was working and we exit the “ooh la-la lounge” not holding hands. Valet runs across the street to a lot, I scuffle my feet inward like I was trying to kick skittles and when I look up they are pulling the truck around the bend. Jerry jumps in and valet is nearly trying to buckle my seatbelt for me. What a nice place.

We stop off at Jerry’s penthouse, specifically because I imagine he wanted to brag of himself again, and I resist no temptation. He was such an intelligent, funny, good-looking man.

“I need to get home, I’ve got practice tomorrow.” I lied. I had no practice and didn’t know what the practice would have been for even if I did.

“Ah, ok.” An interested or even interesting person would’ve asked what I’m practicing for, but him not challenging my lie at that moment—all the better. My arms felt heavier and I wasn’t sure my wit and creativity would’ve been fast enough. We floor the elevator from the penthouse and hop in his car once more. Still, I am a little impressed.

As we pull back up to my house I can feel anticipation building. I was going to start the session then invite him up. I’d feel more comfortable. He goes on about how he likes girls to do this, and a girl he dated did that, and he hated it when she did this. I spaced out and leaned in for the kiss.

Wasn’t bad but I would’ve preferred less spit gushing. We wait. I go in for the kill again. Hair ends up in my mouth and I giggle.

“Your smile is so beautiful.” He’s quickly losing points for unoriginality. I hike down my skirt and lean in again, hoping that the more I kiss him, the less unappealing things he’ll say to me.

“I wish we had gotten food, I’m starving, and tacos would hit the spot right now.” I say bored, and thinking of some Mexican food I would never eat, on a night I would never drink so much, with a feeling I would never have for someone I don’t know past three dates.

I tell two quick stories one of my father when he was going to school to become a dermatologist, and another commenting on his story from the bar— he interrupts.

I rage in my head. All night I’ve listened to this man gloat about himself, talk about his past fights, his drug life, his women, buy me shots of “I hope I get lucky tonight,” and he is now implying that I talk too much? I was planning to have sex with him but now that he’s made it clear that he’d expected it, I can’t.

“Yes, I talk during sex! I talk, and I whisper, and I moan and I might even tell ghost stories!”

I hop out of his car and slam the door. I stumble away as my zebra heel gets stuck in the uneven pavement; I pull it out and nearly fall to the floor. I look backwards to see if he’d seen me but all I could hear as I look back was the roar of his toy truck zizzing off into the night‑mad as a bee sting to the eye. I waddle up the walkway to my porch, kick over a flowerpot, stumble at the screen, open the wooden door, fall to the ground and let the tears drip down my face finally reaching my lace top. I open the oven to feel as I pre-heat and prepare to bake myself a cake. It is my birthday, after all.